02.12 | To Love & Obey
1 John 5
‘For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome.’
1 John 5:3
There is a controversial word that appears in older versions of the Anglican wedding vows:
Obey.
The word appears in the 1549 publication, the Book of Common Prayer (BCP), written under the oversight of the then Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer. The controversy is that the wedding vows were virtually identical for men and women, apart from this word.1 In the BCP, both women and men vowed to love and cherish, and yet only women vowed to obey.
It’s extremely rare to find a couple who wants to use the 1549 words.
Love and obedience are not words that we readily put together. We rightly understand love to operate in the realm of feelings and of freedom—where the love felt by one increases the freedom of another. Obedience, however, sounds like a restriction of freedom. When we begin to talk about obedience, we quickly taste the sour flavours of hierarchy, injustice, and control. Obedience feels demeaning. Obedience feels like oppression. Obedience feels like something demanded by the insecure.
John’s words today, then, do not always land easily with us:
For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments
These words are not merely John’s. Jesus Himself, on the night before He died, spoke these words:
If you love me, you will keep my commandments.2
In other words, the manifestation of our love for God looks like obedience. Love here is not separated from obedience.
In our cultural moment this feels uncomfortable. We are happy with the idea of a God who loves us. We are comfortable with the idea of feeling love for God. And yet, when we speak of love expressed in obedience, alarm bells ring in our ears, and our desire to liberate our lives from a potential oppressor can quickly start to tug at our sleeves for attention.
And yet, my friends, look closer. For John’s words take us deeper into the truer ways of learning to live in the love of God.
For our culture often implies that love is merely a feeling—to be authentically expressed in the moment that we are feeling it, and yet to be abandoned when the feelings pass (as all feelings are prone to do). Be affirmed, for to love God is not to endlessly feel delight and bliss at the thought of Him. Those times come, and yet other seasons come too—when the feelings of love run dry and we find ourselves wondering at how real our faith and devotion truly is. In such moments, let the words of John take us to a different kind of expression of love. Let your obedience be an expression of love. Love Him through how you love your neighbour. Love Him through your integrity, your truthfulness, your acts of compassion, your consistency. Love Him through surrender. For obedience to God, when freely offered, truly can be an act of love. It is the softening of your heart and your will to yield lovingly to His ways. For His commands are not burdensome. Perfect obedience to the Father is the way into the more expansive life.
And, always and forever, remember this. That the love we express is never a one-way street. For the Lord you love gave up His comfort and freedom more perfectly for you than you have yet managed for Him. For He surrendered every right, every comfort, every place of plenty and glory and honour and privilege, stepping into the greatest measure of willingly-chosen disempowerment, to rescue you and set you afresh on the path of glory and of grace. For every act of obedience that we can ever offer, unto death itself, only and ever comes in response to the One who most perfectly loved us first.
Reflect:
Today, do I more greatly need the affirmation to love Him through obedience, or the reminder that all of my surrender to Him comes only in response to His surrender for me?
Pray:
Father,
I love you,
And thus, Father,
I obey.
Would you reframe in my heart
Every act of obedience
As an act of love,
And every act of obedience
As a response to
Being loved first;
That this life become perfect surrender,
Through perfect obedience,
And in perfect love.
In Jesus’ Name,
Amen
Old Testament:
For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:
Daniel 11-12 | Psalm 138
If you’re interested, the other slight difference is that men plight thee my troth, whereas women vow to give thee my troth.
John 14:15